Chocolate Eggs and Jesus Risen

In his lovely reflection on the Psalms, C. S. Lewis remarks on the talent that children have to conflate the religious significance of a holiday with the “merely festal” He tells that one Easter Sunday someone overheard a child muttering to himself “Chocolate eggs and Jesus risen”. The child, bless his heart, cannot disassociate the miracle of the Resurrection from the miracle of candy.

There is a stage in a child’s life at which it cannot separate the religious from the merely festal character of Christmas or Easter. I have been told of a very small and very devout boy who was heard murmuring to himself on Easter morning a poem of his own composition which began ‘Chocolate eggs and Jesus risen’. This seems to me, for his age, both admirable poetry and admirable piety.*

Lewis goes on to say that we eventually grow out of this tendency. For an author who manifestly never grew out of anything, Lewis makes a wondrously naive claim. Can he be so un-self-aware? I appreciate that he had many spiritual gifts; I have benefited over the years from these gifts in his writing. But I find it hard to believe that he didn't, in his very poetic imagination, join the appearance of daffodils and chocolate eggs with the risen Christ.

Ancient festivals, both Jewish and Pagan were magnificent mixes of physical delights, music, food, dance, celebration and sacred observance, the sacrificial offering, the reading of holy texts, chanting. 

I submit that we are not so different today. Those communities thus worshiping/celebrating would have been hard pressed to distinguish what part of their observance was “religious” and what part was “secular,” assuming they even perceived this distinction which historians claim they did not.

We gather in church on Easter Sunday; the organ whips itself into a frenzied prelude. The congregation rises looking proudly on each other in their Easter finery. We grin knowingly at the bouncy children, already enhanced by a few chocolate eggs. The choir marches in and we burst into song.  “Jesus Christ is risen today”

Can you separate this moment of music and joy from the truth of the risen Christ? For me, they are all one. I have no interest in paring away the “fleshly” delights of the holiday. The Puritans tried that and ended up in a dead end.

Our faith teaches us on many levels. We are taught through Scripture. We are taught through homilies. We are taught in the repeated attendance at the Eucharist. We are taught by prayer, by our life’s journey, by each other, and we are taught by creation. It is human to celebrate, to make festivals, to enhance our special moments.

People shake their heads over the increasingly secular treatment of Christmas (mostly) and Easter. I have certainly shaken mine. But maybe it’s not as bad as we think. Maybe someone is eating a chocolate egg and realizing that Easter is behind it. Maybe without that chocolate egg, that person wouldn't have thought about Jesus at all.

I’m not usually an optimist. There are too few disciples of Christ. Churches are too empty. Our elected leaders are too focused on their own re-elections to do what’s best for the country. People have too much money, or much too little. Nothing is right. 

Certainly, there is money to be made at Easter and Christmas, and people are not shy about exploiting the season to line their pockets. I’m just not sure that the proliferation of secular trappings, of chocolate eggs, detracts from the significance of the Resurrection.

We are human. Who made us human? Who sustains our human lives? Who dwells in our human selves? I think that little boy from Lewis’ book grew up, had a nice family, went to church and died in the arms of our Savior. I also think – actually I know – there is someone right now, who certainly wouldn't dare read this post, but who is eating a chocolate egg and wondering about the Resurrection, about Jesus, about himself. 

*Reflections on the Psalms pp 48-49